Opticallimits

I enjoy your lens reviews but have you forgotten about Nikon? For what seems like a year or more, it's been mostly ALL Sony, Canon, etc. lens reviews? WTF!

(11-15-2019, 02:46 AM)Nikkor Noct Wrote: [ -> ]I enjoy your lens reviews but have you forgotten about Nikon? For what seems like a year or more, it's been mostly ALL Sony, Canon, etc. lens reviews? WTF!

Nikon reviews are/were done by another guy, and other things in that guy's life have taken priority.

(11-15-2019, 06:08 AM)Brightcolours Wrote: [ -> ]

(11-15-2019, 02:46 AM)Nikkor Noct Wrote: [ -> ]I enjoy your lens reviews but have you forgotten about Nikon? For what seems like a year or more, it's been mostly ALL Sony, Canon, etc. lens reviews? WTF!

Nikon reviews are/were done by another guy, and other things in that guy's life have taken priority.

 Most lens sites have taken a financial hit, Image Resource is closing ....... and the revenue just isn't there anymore like it was.

It's not about the financial hit, most sites struggle with that. BC summarized it pretty well (thanks BC!): life is what happens, when you just made plans. In that sense, lots of life happened here in the last few years. Fairly regularly, whenever I saw an opportunity to sit down and hopefully regularly find time for reviews again, something new that required attention or was simply distracting showed up.
In any case: I am still around, I actually pile up all kinds of gear for potential future reviews, I still enjoy photography a lot and I sincerely hope that in terms of "life happening" a bit calmer times are ahead now

To put it bluntly and possibly harsh, Markus: Life happens to all of us. When I had to take a break from work due to medical reasons, my boss also had to find a way to get my work at least partly done. But OL just expresses "it's a hobby anyway, we're not making money out of it and all possible sales numbers are decreasing as well, so who cares?"

As much as I hope things will calm down in your life, even out and the sun is shining again, as much I also have to say: until that happens it will possibly be too late to build up another reputation regarding Nikon than the current "pass on, there's nothing new to see here".

But we're not totally without infomation, YouTube "reviews" are spreading and every short time another "new reviewer" pops up and spreads his mostly meaningless opinions all over the place. So, there is a need for clean, reliable and possibly objective facts. And there still are sites delivering it. But numbers and scales are not the only characteristics counting, some could not become rated. The longer I take photos, the more I believe in "go and rent it and find your own summary or conclusion"

On the other hand: On Nikon's DSLR side there's not much going on. On Nikon's mirrorless side there are close to no alternatives to a rather limited lens selection - either one accepts the higher prices or looks for other mirrorless systems. I actually don't need any review about the manual focus 35 or 50 mm shards for the Z-system. 3rd party lenses for DSLR (and adapted to Z) I also can find in the rather vivid Canon section. They will not perform worse on Nikon except on some characteristics OL doesn't/can't test.

However, we as possible customers and you as a service website can ask ourselves: Was it a really good idea to do and to consume all this hours of work for free? And as soon as advertisement income decreases, the whole model goes South? Most serious photographic magazines cost around 10-20 $ per issue. New lenses are continuously pouring in. But it has been a while since I was excited about a certain one.

Sorry but that comment is as cheap as it gets, JJ. It's not your time nor your private money.

As mentioned, commercially this is barely viable what we are doing here so an argument like "any employer has a contingency plan" is just plain nuts.
What do you expect? That I sell my apartment and work 24/7 for nothing just to make a community happy till I die an early death?
With "He sacrificed himself for Nikon readers" written on my grave, or what?

FYI - in a good month, we get about 100-120USD in donations, in a bad month about 30USD - so that's the direct support we receive from the community.
This doesn't even cover the costs for the test cameras.

I do not complain about the situation but I do draw red lines.

First, it's my time to write something in this forum - and I "invested" plenty of it to add some things which were not in a conclusion or to write a bit about lenses not tested yet or in the near future. A couple of times I answered on questions to Nikon lenses, just because there was no review available on it.

Second, it's also my money to buy a lens or a camera and later comment on it or help people who ask questions.

Third, it's not my website. So, if you guys decide it's okay to ignore Nikon's latest developments for about two years in your review section I actually think that Nikon users will get their information elsewhere. I can't recall to have demanded you to step in, Klaus - if you feel attacked, I'm sorry and it was not my intention to make you feel this way. Therefore again: not my problem. I just feel sorry for the people trying to read well written Nikon reviews like we were used to for actual lenses. They will turn their backs. And after a couple of tries, they also will not come back.

I don't accept a comment like "cheap". If it were only lens tests and no forum, I don't think OL survived until today. The value of this community adds for sure to the value of lens tests.

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(11-15-2019, 08:02 AM)mst Wrote: [ -> ]...In any case: I am still around, I actually pile up all kinds of gear for potential future reviews, I still enjoy photography a lot and I sincerely hope that in terms of "life happening" a bit calmer times are ahead now

• You're voice is missed here in this forum, at least by me. What made you speak up now?
  
• Piling up gear for "better times to come" will grow a mountain of work. And the fact that the gear will be outdated, boring and chewed through when you one day find time to start a review about it, would not motivate me to write or read the review.
  
• Are you guys to scared to ask somebody else to step in as long as you're on indetermined leave? Sure, it's better to always use the same devices, but no one wants to know anymore how a lens performs in front of a D3 - and last time we met you already were about to order a D850, and that was like 3 years ago.
  

I do want OL to carry on, I don't believe in YT videos as a replacement of written words. And I do want to find a lens section up to date for Nikon. I do not think that waiting for better days to come will be a long term solution.

Joju, if you're so adamant to see Nikon reviews and not understanding of Markus' life situation (and more generally OL), how about investing your time to resume Nikon reviews? Maybe then, you'll be a bit more understanding.

To be fair, would not be upto JoJu to him to make the decision to take over Nikon reviews for OL. And I doubt that OL would be open for any such suggestion, anyway. The stagnation of reviews for the Nikon platform(s) on PZ and now OL is a fact, as is that they apparently are missed. I do not blame Markus in any way for not having time, or drive, for them. But (like with other things here, like sharpening) a real conversation about this is not appreciated by Klaus. Yes, I know that JoJu words things aggressively, I am often the target of that and often disagree. But that does not mean that inbetween there are no valid remarks.

On a side note, I bet there are no donations by Nikon users for years now ;-)
On another side note, I don't think it is just the Nikon lens part that has slowed down, there are MANY other lenses that have not been reviewed, for years. Just the Nikon platform(s) show the most glaring hiatus.

Yet another side note: There are NOT many lens review sites that try to do a serious job. I know just two: PZ/OL and Lenstip. Others are too superficial or too flawed to take serioulsy (looking at you, DXOmark ).

(11-15-2019, 11:35 AM)thxbb12 Wrote: [ -> ]Joju, if you're so adamant to see Nikon reviews and not understanding of Markus' life situation (and more generally OL), how about investing your time to resume Nikon reviews? Maybe then, you'll be a bit more understanding.

No problem, I just don't see/read OL asking for helping out.

It's not the lack of understanding for "Life happens", it's more the contradictive signs sent out:

No turnaround, so nothing to complain about for readers
Not enough income from the site
private hobby, so no obligations
decreasing sales of all brands, so "end of photography as we knew it"
pile of gear to review

In a way I see OL saying "Why should we keep it going?" as a sort of constant threat. At the same time Klaus is reviewing furtheron in his segments and the others appear abandoned.